Recently, consumers have expressed significant interest in “place shifting” devices that allow viewing of television or other media content at locations other than their primary television set. Placeshifting devices typically packetize media content that can be transmitted over a local or wide area network to a portable computer, mobile phone, personal digital assistant, remote television or other remote device capable of playing back the packetized media stream for the viewer. Placeshifting therefore allows consumers to view their media content from remote locations such as other rooms, hotels, offices, and/or any other locations where portable media player devices can gain access to a wireless or other communications network.
Some media content received by placeshifting devices incorporates one or more forms of copy-protection. For example, a particularly popular interface for viewing media content is the high-definition multimedia interface (HDMI), which is incorporated into many modern displays and entertainment devices. HDMI™ is often used in such devices in conjunction with high-bandwidth digital content protection (HDCP). Unfortunately, however, compliance with the applicable HDMI/HDCP licensing requirements (as well as technical safeguards) greatly limits the ability of an entertainment device to retransmit (e.g., placeshift) content protected by HDCP, even when that same content might have been legally placeshifted had it been received through another interface, such as component video or the like.
It is therefore desirable to provide systems and methods for improving the placeshifting experience of users having home entertainment devices utilizing an HDMI/HDCP interface in addition to other media interfaces. These and other desirable features and characteristics will become apparent from the subsequent detailed description and the appended claims, taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings and this background section.